Wondering at the Future

I'm sitting at my desktop on a Monday morning. Still glad and thankful for the holiday. I initially planned to be out of town. Somehow, it didn't materialized due to a number of factors. But I'm still glad that today there's no work.

But not for long. As the clock ticks, the day will end. And tomorrow, it's work day. There's no escaping it, isn't it?

I read somewhere that US stats show that most of the heart attacks and strokes happen between 8 to 10 in the morning, on a Monday! I don't know what that means, but the author humurously commented that that is the effect of work on the modern man.

More and more people dread coming to work. And that just struck me.

Maybe the profession to which I belong, Human Resources, have been doing a lousy job in terms of employee motivation. But then again, it is not be expected that it is solely HR's job. Statistics also show that the primary reason for employees leaving a company, especially the high potential ones, are not HR, nor the company's compensation. It is their direct superiors.

Lots of arguments and discussions can be made about this, but in the end, the feeling that comes during the first day of the work week remains. Maybe this is what it feels to be in the rat race, as they call it.

You don't love your job anymore. But you keep doing it anyway because it puts food on the table, for you and your family. You don't love some of the people at work. But you work with them anyway because you don't have a choice. And so the wondering continues. Is there a better way?

It takes a hero to break through this barrier of emotion, and to accept things as they are, not because you like them but because you have to. Meanwhile, one has to keep convincing himself or herself that you like what you do, that you enjoy being where you are, until that heroism dawns on you.

Work is such a funny thing. Maybe that's why they call it labor. It's not supposed to be enjoyed...